


Project Peregrinus

by crimsonThalposis



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Humanised Names, Humanstuck (kind of), Kind of a WIP but we'll get there, Multi, Not really space opera but kind of, Space Opera
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-13
Updated: 2018-04-13
Packaged: 2019-04-19 15:21:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14240172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crimsonThalposis/pseuds/crimsonThalposis
Summary: "I'm not entirely sure what you thought this was going to achieve.""You're here, aren't you?""I'm always here. It's an awfully small spaceship."They were the second wave. A team of twenty exceptional children sent to space, set to become something other than human and begin the conquest of the stars. Extensive bodily modifications were the key, experiments half-finished and astronauts half-grown. The Project's ethics were indefensible, and yet the children would ride the apocalypse towards their new star. This is the story of their journey.





	Project Peregrinus

There was a moment, before everything went to hell, of peace. Captain Meena Pacer's boots clicked against the bridge in a solid rhythm as she lived up to her name, pacing back and forth with the occasional barking order or gruff word of praise. The technicians were typing leisurely away at their v-boards, goggles on. Mitchell and Kurtis were buried in their headsets, directing the ship with minute and complex gestures far beyond her understanding. Behind them was Kayne in the exterior camera booth, quietly reeling off their orders into a microphone. The navigator's miniscule adjustments were always right, she had faith in that much.

The bridge's internal rhythm of click-clack-snap-whisper was often present for hours on end, a symphony that every crew member contributed to when they entered and felt the loss of when they slept or ate or whatever else there was to do in space. Which, as she had made abundantly clear at the beginning of their little trip, would not be each other. For the past six months that rule had held - which Meena considered a sign of serious respect at this point.

She smirked at the thought, and was still smirking when the local gravitational generator failed. As the only person in the room who wasn't strapped down, Meena was thrown into the wall as if by a vengeful and childlike god as Rupert and Latina wrested for control of the auxiliary generator and it resisted. She thanked the stars once again for the resilience of her relatively new form. Before The Project, a blow like that would have shattered her ribcage like so much spun candy. Before the project, she would have looked like a little girl and not an alien. Her gills spasmed in disagreement, but that might have just been the drop.

She picked herself up after the metaphorical dust had settled and stormed over to the technicians. Their hands were blurs on invisible keyboards, and Meena practically snarled, "Fucking hell. What's going on, Pyanowski? Nighting?! What was that?" She pinched the bridge of her nose with a long-suffering sigh, nausea setting in.

And then Latina paused in her work and glanced up for a moment, glanced with solemn eyes that pierced Meena's spirit and pinned it to the nearest bulkhead. "Complications."

In an instant, her anger and illness were gone. In their place was fear. In space, complications meant a one-way ticket to the void. Authority cooled the Captain's voice as she held up her wrist to activate the intercom. "Officers Marley, Sarkson and Ampell to the bridge, effective immediately. All officers to the bridge, effective fucking immediately. Not a drill." That should do it.

No less than thirteen clacks of her heel against the bridge later, Third Mate and Flight Officer Aranea Sarkson swept into the room with an almost audible fanfare. Unimpressed, Meena clicked her fingers in the direction of the cockpit. "Translate for me, Sarkson. Mitch and Kurt. Tell me what they're doing." She knew better than to interrupt the pilots' neural link, but Aranea knew the language of interstellar travel better than anyone. Literally, seeing as the only other three scholars were occupied several metres away.

Eyes narrowed, her second-in-second-in-command looked from Meena to the boys and back again. With six extra pupils wobbling along for the ride, the effect was disturbing and mutinous. Finally, the girl spoke, in the dreamy murmur of interpretation. "Two degrees crossline across sectors fourteen through twenty-one. Pinpoint seven degrees roll along the third parallax. Barelling at attachment speed with starboard weights at maximum. What are they doing? It's almost like they're trying to maneuver through an-"

Across the room, Kayne ripped off his restraints and stood with a shrill noise of desperation. "Asteroid field," he confirmed grimly, worrying handfuls of black curls as if it would do any good. "Brace yourselves.

The _Alpha_ 's Second Mate and Operations Officer Poppy Marley didn't so much sprint as fall through the door as shuddering and groaning overtook the ship. It lurched suddenly and momentarily downwards - or in the direction that down currently was - and for a moment Aranea and Meena were hanging from railings that were now on the ceiling. Poppy opened her mouth in surprise and was gone, the main bay window Meena and Kayne monitored rushing up to meet her.

Mitchell rolled them back to stability with an unintelligble grunt of effort, and three girls fell. One did not rise. She lay like a broken doll against three feet of triple-glazed diamond-infused glass. Kayne moaned like a wounded animal and began to run towards her. Lucky for the rest of them then that Flight Officer Sarkson, as Meena preferred to think of her these days, ordered him to sit down with a tone she hadn't used since the Mitch incident. Considering the circumstances, the Captain let it slide and stepped back. Behind her, Kayne's infantile face crumpled, but he sat and began again to guide the pilots out of the field with renewed vigour. 

Various alarms wailed throughout the ship in a discordant rhythm that drowned out the familar pattern of click-clack-snap-whisper and set everyone on edge. Which was their job, Meena supposed as Horace and Conan sprinted around the corner, battered- and bruised-looking. Loadmaster Zachariah and First Mate and Executive Officer Ampell, that was. Two jagged cuts wept purple from Conan's right temple, and Horace's skin was more blue than grey. The absurdity of that thought was almost hilarious. Almost. They sagged against the wall together.

Finally the engineers jogged into the bridge, which was beginning to feel rather small. Misses Larkin and Meagan made quite the pair. Their overalls were saturated with oil and sweat from the systems room and their journey from the other end of the ship, and they were both horrified. From Marlene's frantic signing and Dakota's angry streams of broken Japanese, Meena got the basic idea. The shields were failing. They needed to be out of the field and in open space within the next hour at most.

At least everyone was inside the bridge now. Holding a rag to his head and wiping blood from his eyes, Conan muttered something. Everyone in a position of authority whipped around and the officer raised his voice. "Lockdown, if you please." Latina and Rupert simultaneously executed a command none of them had ever wanted to see and all knew by heart. Complete lockdown and depressurisation of the rest of the ship. That would give them the juice to hightail it out of here. Another, smaller impact shuddered through the spine of the ship and this time everyone fell except the pilots, from their feet or from their chairs.

"Fuck." The vehemence of Rupert's curse was enough to catch the attention of them all.

"Where's Callie?"

And then Dakota was gone and Conan, who had almost got back up after bracing himself on the railing, was back down with a purple handprint rising on his cheek. The blast doors began to lower. Their specialist engineer was gone and their life support systems technician was almost certainly dead.

Captain Meena Pacer's badge clacked against the floor. Wild laughter bubbled from the cockpit. She opened her mouth and-

There was a quiet thunk. Then a blast of light. Then nothing but static.

* * *

It is the fifth time they have shown you the tape. Nobody threw up this time. Crying was a different matter, but that's an unspoken exception.

You are not procrastinating children. You do not want to be in this room, choked with the ghosts of those who came before you.

But despite how prettily groomed you have been and how flowery the language they use to explain the cause might be, the liquid salvation that has been waiting for you for so long may as well be poison.

Unless you are better.

 


End file.
